Early life[edit]

Morricone was born in Rome, the son of Libera and his musician father Mario. His family came from Arpino, near Frosinone. Morricone, who had four siblings, Adriana, Aldo, Maria and Franco, lived in the Trastevere quarter in the centre of Rome, with his parents. Mario was a trumpet player who worked professionally in different light-music orchestras, while Libera set up a small textile business.[3] Morricone wrote his first compositions when he was six years old and was encouraged to develop his natural talents.[4]

Classical education[edit]

His first teacher was Mario Morricone, who taught him how to read music and also play a few instruments. Luckily, Morricone's musical inclinations and talent proved to be natural as well as precocious and he started composing music at the age of six. Compelled to take up the trumpet, he entered the National Academy of Santa Cecilia, to take trumpet lessons under the guidance of Umberto Semproni.[5]

Morricone formally entered the conservatory in 1940 when he was 12, enrolling in a four-year harmony program. He completed it within six months.[6] He studied the trumpet, composition, and choral music, and direction under Goffredo Petrassi, who influenced him; Morricone has since dedicated his concert pieces to Petrassi.

After he graduated, he continued to work in classical composition and arrangement. In 1946, he received his Diploma in Trumpet and in the same year he composed "Il Mattino" ("The Morning") for voice and piano on a text by Fukuko, first in a group of seven "youth" Lieder. In the following years, he continued to write music for the theatre as well as classical music for voice and piano, such as "Imitazione", based on a text by Italian poet Giacomo Leopardi, "Intimità", based on a text by Olinto Dini, "Distacco I" and "Distacco II" with words by R. Gnoli, "Oboe Sommerso" for baritone and five instruments with words by poet Salvatore Quasimodo and "Verrà la Morte", for contralto and piano, based on a text by novelist Cesare Pavese.[7]

Career[edit]

Early[edit]

In 1953 Morricone was asked by Gorni Kramer and Lelio Luttazzi to write an arrangement for some medleys in an American style for a series of evening radio shows. The composer continued with the composition of other 'serious' classical pieces, thus demonstrating the flexibility and eclecticism which will always be an integral part of his character. Many orchestral and chamber compositions date, in fact, from the period between 1954 and 1959: Musica per archi e pianoforte (1954), Invenzione, Canone e Ricercare per piano; Sestetto per flauto, oboe, fagotto, violino, viola e violoncello (1955), Dodici Variazione per oboe, violoncello e piano; Trio per clarinetto, corno e violoncello; Variazione su un tema di Frescobaldi (1956); Quattro pezzi per chitarra (1957); Distanze per violino, violoncello e piano; Musica per undici violini, Tre Studi per flauto, clarinetto e fagotto (1958); and the Concerto per orchestra (1957), dedicated to his teacher Goffredo Petrassi.[8]

Morricone soon gained popularity by writing his first background music for radio dramas and quickly moved into film.[9]

Composing for radio, television and pop artists[edit]

In 1956, Morricone started to support his family by playing in a jazz band and arranging pop songs for the Italian broadcasting service RAI. He was hired by RAI in 1958, but quit his job on his first day at work when he was told that broadcasting of music composed by employees was forbidden by a company rule. Subsequently, Morricone became a top studio arranger at RCA, working with Renato Rascel, Rita Pavone, and Mario Lanza.

In 1963 the composer co-wrote (with Roby Ferrante) the music for the composition "Ogni volta" ("Every Time"), a song that was performed by Paul Anka for the first time during the Festival di San Remo in 1964. This song was arranged and conducted by Morricone and sold over three million copies worldwide, including one million copies in Italy alone.[12]

Another particular success was his composition, "Se telefonando".[13] Performed by Mina, it was a standout track of Studio Uno 66, the fifth-biggest-selling album of the year 1966 in Italy.[14] Morricone's sophisticated arrangement of "Se telefonando" was a combination of melodic trumpet lines, Hal Blaine–style drumming, a string set, a '60s Europop female choir, and intensive subsonic-sounding trombones. The Italian Hitparade #7 song had eight transitions of tonality building tension throughout the chorus. During the following decades, the song was covered by several performers in Italy and abroad most notably by Françoise Hardy and Iva Zanicchi (1966), Delta V (2005), Vanessa and the O's (2007), and Neil Hannon (2008).[15]Françoise Hardy - Mon amie la rose site In the reader's poll conducted by the la Repubblica newspaper to celebrate Mina's 70th anniversary in 2010, 30,000 voters picked the track as the best song ever recorded by Mina.[16]

First film scores[edit]

After graduating in 1954, Morricone started writing and arranging music as a ghost writer for films credited to other already well-known composers, while also arranging for many light music orchestras of the RAI television network, working most notably with Armando Trovajoli and Carlo Savina. He occasionally adopted Anglicized pseudonyms, such as Dan Savio and Leo Nichols.

In 1959, Morricone was the conductor (and uncredited co-composer) for Mario Nascimbene's score to Morte Di Un Amico (Death of a Friend), an Italian drama directed by Franco Rossi. In the same year, he composed music for the theatre show Il Lieto Fine by Luciano Salce.

The 1960s began on a positive note: 1961 marked in fact his real film debut with Luciano Salce's Il Federale (The Fascist). In an interview with American composer Fred Karlin, Morricone discussed his beginnings, stating, My first films were light comedies or costume movies that required simple musical scores that were easily created, a genre that I never completely abandoned even when I went on to much more important films with major directors.[18]

Morricone wrote more works in the climate of the Italian avant-garde. A few of these compositions have been made available on CD, such as "Ut", his trumpet concerto dedicated to the soloist Mauro Maur, one of his favorite musicians; some have yet to be premiered.

The Group and New Consonance[edit]

From 1964 up to their eventual disbandment in 1980, he was part of Gruppo di Improvvisazione di Nuova Consonanza (G.I.N.C.), a group of composers who performed and recorded avant garde free improvisations. The Rome-based avant-garde ensemble was dedicated to the development of improvisation and new music methods. The ensemble functioned as a laboratory of sorts, working with anti-musical systems and noise techniques in an attempt to redefine the new music ensemble and explore "New Consonance."[20]

Known as "The Group" or "Il Gruppo", they released seven albums across the Deutsche Grammophon, RCA and Cramps labels: Gruppo di Improvvisazione Nuova Consonanza (1966), The Private Sea of Dreams (1967), Improvisationen (1968), The Feed-back (1970), Improvvisazioni a Formazioni Variate (1973), Nuova Consonanza (1975) and Musica su Schemi (1976). Perhaps the most famous of these is their album entitled The Feed-back, which combines free jazz and avant-garde classical music with funk; the album is frequently sampled by hip-hop DJs and is considered to be one of the most collectable records in existence, often fetching over $1,000 at auction.[21]

Morricone played a key role in The Group and was among the core members in its revolving line-up; in addition to serving as their trumpet player, he directed them on many occasions and they can be heard on a large number of his scores from the 1970s.

Held in high regard in avant-garde music circles, they are considered to be the first experimental composers collective, their only peers being the British improvisation collective AMM. Their influence can be heard in free improvising ensembles from the European movements including Evan Parker Electro-Acoustic Ensemble, the Swiss electronic free improvisation group Voice Crack, John Zorn[22] and in the techniques of modern classical music and avant-garde jazz groups. The ensemble's groundbreaking work informed their work in composition. The ensemble did also perform in varying capacities with Morricone adding noise to some of his '60s and '70s Italian soundtracks, including A Quiet Place in the Country (1969) and Cold Eyes of Fear (1971).[23]

Composing for comedy pictures[edit]

His earliest scores were Italian light comedy and costume pictures, where Morricone learned to write simple, memorable themes. During the sixties he composed the scores for comedies such as Dino Risi's Il Successo (1962), Lina Wertmüller's I basilischi.,[18]Franco Indovina's Menage all'italiana and L'Alibi.

These scores include cheerful tunes, some pop arrangements, lounge jazz and often dazzling vocals - all of them featuring a Morricone flair.

Spaghetti Westerns[edit]

Though his first films were undistinguished, Morricone's arrangement of an American folk song intrigued director and former schoolmate Sergio Leone. Before being associated with Leone, Morricone had already composed some music for less-known western movies such as Gunfight at Red Sands'/'Duello nel Texas (1963). In 1962 Morricone met American folksinger Peter Tevis, who is credited with singing the lyrics of Morricone's songs such as "A Gringo Like Me" (from Gunfight at Red Sands) and "Lonesome Billy" (from Guns Don't Argue).[25]

Association with Sergio Leone[edit]

The turning point in Morricone's career took place in 1964, the year in which his third child, Andrea Morricone, also to become a film composer, was born. Film director Sergio Leone hired Morricone, and together they created a distinctive score to accompany Leone's different version of the Western, A Fistful of Dollars (1964).

The Dollars trilogy[edit]

As budget strictures limited Morricone's access to a full orchestra, he used gunshots, cracking whips, whistle, voices, jew's harp, trumpets, and the new Fender electric guitar, instead of orchestral arrangements of Western standards a la John Ford. Morricone used his special effects to punctuate and comically tweak the action—cluing in the audience to the taciturn man's ironic stance. Though sonically bizarre for a movie score, Morricone's music was viscerally true to Leone's vision.

As memorable as Leone's close-ups, harsh violence, and black comedy, Morricone's work helped to expand the musical possibilities of film scoring. Morricone was initially billed on the film as Dan Savio. A Fistful of Dollars came out in Italy in 1964 and was released in America three years later, greatly popularizing the so-called Spaghetti Western genre. For the American release, Sergio Leone and Ennio Morricone decided to adopt American sounding names, so they called themselves respectively Bob Robertson and Dan Savio. Over the film's theatrical release, it grossed more than any other Italian film up to that point.[26] The film debuted in the United States in January 1967, where it grossed $4.5 million for the year.[26] It eventually grossed $14.5 million in its American release[26] against its budget of $200–250,000.[27][28]

With the score of A Fistful of Dollars, Morricone began his 20-year collaboration with his childhood friend Alessandro Alessandroni and his Cantori Moderni.[29] Alessandroni provided the whistling and the twanging guitar on the film scores, while his Cantori Moderni were a flexible troupe of modern singers. Morricone specifically exploited the solo soprano of the group, Edda Dell'Orso, at the height of her powers "an extraordinary voice at my disposal".

The composer subsequently scored Leone's other two Dollars Trilogy (or Man with No Name Trilogy) spaghetti westerns: For a Few Dollars More (1965) and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966). All three films starred the American actor Clint Eastwood as The Man With No Name and depicted Leone's own intense vision of the mythical West. Some of the music was written before the film, which was unusual. Leone's films were made like that because he wanted the music to be an important part of it; he kept the scenes longer because he did not want the music to end. According to Morricone this explains why the films are so slow.

Despite the small film budgets, the Dollars Trilogy was a box-office success. The available budget for The Good, the Bad and The Ugly was about $1,200,000, but it became the most successful film of the Dollars Trilogy, grossing $25,100,000 in the United States and over 2,3 billion lire (1,2 million EUR) in Italy alone. Morricone's score became a major success and sold over three million copies worldwide. On August 14, 1968, the original score was certified by the RIAA with a golden record for the sale of 500,000 copies in the United States only.[30]

The collaboration with Leone is considered one of the exemplary collaborations between a director and a composer. Morricone's last score for Leone was for his last film, the gangster drama Once Upon a Time in America (1984). Leone died on April 30, 1989, of a heart attack at the age of 60. Before his death in 1989, Leone was part-way through planning a film on the Siege of Leningrad, set during World War II. By 1989, Leone had been able to acquire $100 million in financing from independent backers for the war epic. He had convinced Morricone to compose the film score. The project was canceled when Leone died two days before he was to officially sign on for the film. In early 2003, Italian filmmaker Giuseppe Tornatore announced he would direct a film called Leningrad.[46] The film has yet to go into production.

Dramas and political movies[edit]

With Leone's films, Ennio Morricone's name had been put firmly on the map. Most of Morricone's film scores of the 1960s were composed outside the Spaghetti Western genre, while still using Alessandroni's team. Their music included the themes for Il Malamondo (1964), Slalom (1965) and Listen, Let's Make Love (1967). In 1968, Morricone reduced his work outside the movie business and wrote scores for 20 films in the same year. The scores included psychedelic accompaniment for Mario Bava's superhero romp Danger: Diabolik (1968)

In the same year, Morricone composed the score for the less-known drama Maddalena (1971) by the Polish film director Jerzy Kawalerowicz which included its composition 'Chi Mai'. The theme appeared on the million-selling score for Georges Lautner's Le Professionnel (1981),[50] as well as the TV series, An Englishman's Castle (1978) and The Life and Times of David Lloyd George (1981).[51] Because of its appearance on the latter, "Chi Mai" reached number 2 on the UK Singles Chart in 1981.[52] The single was certified by the BPI with a golden record on May 1, 1981[53] and sold over 900,000 copies in France alone.[54] "Chi Mai" is also the name of the online community about Morricone, which offers a repository of information and a free online magazine called "Maestro", containing reviews, articles, discoveries and free comments.[55]

In the beginning of the 1970s, Morricone achieved success with other singles, including A Fistful of Dynamite (1971) and God With Us (1974), having sold respectively 477,000 and 378,000 copies in France only.[56][57]

Hollywood career[edit]

The Dollars Trilogy was not released in the United States until 1967 when United Artists, who had already enjoyed success distributing the British-produced James Bond films in the United States, decided to release Sergio Leone's Spaghetti Westerns. The American release gave Morricone an exposure in America and his film music became quite popular in the United States.[59]

One of Morricone's first contributions to an American director concerned his music for the religious epic film The Bible: In the Beginning by John Huston. According to Sergio Miceli's book Morricone, la musica, il cinema, Morricone wrote about 15 or 16 minutes of music, which were recorded for a screen test and conducted by Franco Ferrara. At first Morricone's teacher Goffredo Petrassi had been engaged to write the score for the great big budget epic, but Huston preferred another composer. RCA Records then proposed Morricone who was under contract with them, but a conflict between the film's producer Dino De Laurentiis and RCA occurred. The producer wanted to have the exclusive rights for the soundtrack, while RCA still had the monopoly on Morricone at that time and did not want to release the composer. Subsequently Morricone's work was rejected because he did not get the ok by RCA to work for Dino De Laurentiis alone. The composer reused the parts of his unused score for The Bible: In the Beginning in such films as The Return of Ringo (1965) by Duccio Tessari and Alberto Negrin's The Secret of the Sahara (1987).

Morricone never left Rome to compose his music and never learned to speak English. But given that the composer has always worked in a wide field of composition genres, from absolute music, which he has always produced, to applied music, working as orchestrator as well as conductor in the recording field, and then as a composer for theatre, radio and cinema, the impression arises that he never really cared that much about his standing in the eyes of Hollywood.[60]

In 1978, the composer worked with Terrence Malick for Days of Heaven, starring Richard Gere. During the lengthy editing process of the romantic drama, which won an Academy Award for Best Cinematography with an additional three nominations for the score, Terrence Malick and Billy Weber made use of a temporary score dominated by Morricone's music for the Bernardo Bertolucci film Novecento. Malick also chose the ethereal Aquarium music from Camille Saint-Saëns ("The Carnival of the Animals") to frame the film. When Malick decided he wanted Morricone to score his movie, the director sent a version of it to Italy with the Novecento temp track in place. Morricone agreed to the assignment and Malick flew to Italy because the composer did not fly, so would not travel to the United States. Malick took the movie over to Morricone in Italy and Morricone was writing for Days of Heaven the whole time. Afterwards they scored the music in Italy. In Days of Heaven, Morricone's elegiac music coexists with pre-existing selections.

Association with Roland Joffé[edit]

The Mission, directed by Joffé, was about a piece of history considerably more distant, as Spanish Jesuitmissionaries see their work undone as a tribe of Paraguayan natives fall within a territorial dispute between the Spanish and Portuguese. Morricone's score is considered as an example of an absolute pinnacle of what music can do for a film, and what a soundtrack album can do to enrich the listener's life. At one point the score was one of the world's best-selling film scores, selling over 3 million copies worldwide.[63][64]

Morricone finally received a second Oscar nomination for The Mission.[65] Morricone's original score lost out to Herbie Hancock's coolly arranged jazz on Bertrand Tavernier's Round Midnight. It was considered as a surprising win and a controversial one, given that much of the music in the film was pre-existing.[66] Morricone stated the following during a 2001 interview with The Guardian: "I definitely felt that I should have won for The Mission. Especially when you consider that the Oscar-winner that year was Round Midnight, which was not an original score. It had a very good arrangement by Herbie Hancock, but it used existing pieces. So there could be no comparison with The Mission. There was a theft!"[67] His score for The Mission was ranked at number 1 in a poll of the all-time greatest film scores. The top 10 list was compiled by 40 film composers such as Michael Giacchino and Carter Burwell.[66] The score is ranked 23rd on the AFI's list of 25 greatest film scores of all time.[68]

In a 2001 interview with The Guardian, Morricone stated that he had good experiences with De Palma: "De Palma is delicious! He respects music, he respects composers. For The Untouchables, everything I proposed to him was fine, but then he wanted a piece that I didn't like at all, and of course we didn't have an agreement on that. It was something I didn't want to write - a triumphal piece for the police. I think I wrote nine different pieces for this in total and I said, 'Please don't choose the seventh!' because it was the worst. And guess what he chose? The seventh one. But it really suits the movie."[67]

"He doesn't have a piano in his studio, I always thought that with composers, you sit at the piano, and you try to find the melody. There's no such thing with Morricone. He hears a melody, and he writes it down. He hears the orchestration completely done", said Barry Levinson in an interview.[71]

Extensive reuse of his music[edit]

Besides the 500 original film scores that have been composed by Morricone for movies and television series in a career of over six decades, his music is in addition frequently reused in more than 150 other film projects. Morricone's compositions appeared in the German TV series Derrick (1989), the live-action comedy film Inspector Gadget, Ally McBeal (2001), The Simpsons (2002), The Sopranos (2001–2002) and more recently in Dancing with the Stars (2010).

In 2012, Morricone composed the song "Ancora Qui" with lyrics by Italian singer Elisa for Tarantino's Django Unchained, a track that appeared together with three existing music tracks composed by Morricone on the soundtrack. "Ancora Qui" was one of the contenders for an Academy Award nomination in the Best Original Song category, but eventually the song was not nominated.[79] On January 4, 2013, Morricone presented Tarantino with a Life Achievement Award at a special ceremony being cast as a continuation of the International Rome Film Festival.[80]

In 2014, Morricone's song Giu' La Testa featured in Florian Habicht's feature film Pulp: a Film about Life, Death & Supermarkets, an unconventional rockumentary about British group Pulp which premiered at SXSW that year.

He wrote the score for the Mafia television series La piovra seasons 2 to 10 from 1985 to 2001, including the themes "Droga e sangue" ("Drugs and Blood"), "La Morale", and "L'Immorale". Morricone worked as the conductor of seasons 3 to 5 of the series. He also worked as the music supervisor for the television project La bibbia ("The Bible").

With an estimated 13 million viewers, Karol: A Man Who Became Pope became an incredible success. Morricone wrote additional music for the sequel, Karol: The Pope, The Man (2006), which portrayed Karol's life as Pope from his papal inauguration to his death. Both scores were originally released respectively in 2005 and 2006. One year later, a double disc album with both scores is released.

Recent works[edit]

In 2003, Morricone scored another epic, for Japanese television, called Musashi and was the Taiga drama about Miyamoto Musashi, Japan's legendary warrior. A part of his "applied music" is now applied to Italian television films.

Since 2004, Morricone wrote music for almost exclusively Italian television movies and mini-series, especially for directors such as Giuseppe Tornatore, Alberto Negrin, Giuliano Montaldo and Franza Di Rosa.

Tarantino originally wanted Morricone to compose the soundtrack for his film, Inglourious Basterds. However, Morricone refused because of the sped-up production schedule of the film.[84][85] Tarantino did use several Morricone tracks from previous films in the soundtrack. Morricone instead wrote the music for Baaria - La porta del vento by Tornatore. It was the second time Morricone's turned down the director, he also turned down an offer to write some music for "Pulp Fiction" in 1994.[86]

In spring and summer 2010, Morricone worked with Hayley Westenra for a collaboration on her album Paradiso.[87] The album features new songs written by Morricone, as well as some of his best-known film compositions of the last 50 years.[88][89] Hayley recorded the album with Morricone's orchestra in Rome during the summer of 2010.[90][91][92]

In 2012, Morricone collaborated with international pop classical crossover singer/songwriter Romina Arena supporting her on the making of a new album which includes a collection of all of his greatest movie scores reinterpreted by Arena's own voice and lyrics. The album is entitled Morricone Uncovered and was released on September 18, 2012, by Perseverance Records.[93]

Morricone composed the music for The Best Offer (2013) by Giuseppe Tornatore.[94] He is also attached to write the score for the upcoming movie by Tornatore: Leningrad (2014).

On October 24, 2012, Morricone's management announced that the composer is set to score the upcoming animated movie The Canterville Ghost (2014), from producers Robert Chandler and Gina Carter, directed by Kim Burdon.[95]

Orchestrating, conducting and live performing[edit]

Before receiving his diplomas in trumpet, composition and instrumentation from the conservatory, Morricone was already active as a trumpet player, often performing in an orchestra that specialized in music written for films. After completing his education at Saint Cecilia, the composer honed his orchestration skills as an arranger for Italian radio and television. In order to support himself, he moved to RCA in the early sixties and entered the front ranks of the Italian recording industry.[96] Since 1964, Morricone was also a founding member of the Rome-based avant-garde ensemble Gruppo di Improvvisazione di Nuova Consonanza. During the existence of the group (until 1978), Morricone performed several times with the group as trumpet player.

To ready his music for live performance, he joined smaller pieces of music together into longer suites. Rather than single pieces, which would require the audience to applaud every few minutes, Morricone thought the best idea was to create a series of suites lasting from 15 to 20 minutes, which form a sort of symphony in various movements — alternating successful pieces with personal favorites. In concert, Morricone normally has 180 to 200 musicians and vocalists under his baton, performing multiple genre-crossing collections of music. Rock, symphonic and ethnic instruments share the stage.[97]

Morricone performed over 200 concerts as of 2001.[107] Since 2001, the composer has been on a world tour, the latter part sponsored by Giorgio Armani, with the Orchestra Roma Sinfonietta, touring London (Barbican 2001; 75th birthday Concerto, Royal Albert Hall 2003), Paris, Verona, and Tokyo. Morricone performed his classic film scores at the Munich Philharmonie in 2005 and Hammersmith Apollo Theatre in London, UK, on December 1 & 2, 2006.

He made his North American concert debut on January 29, 2007, at the Auditorio Nacional in Mexico City and four days later at Radio City Music Hall in New York City. The previous evening, Morricone had already presented at the United Nations a concert comprising some of his film themes, as well as the cantata Voci dal silenzio to welcome the new Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon. A Los Angeles Times review bemoaned the poor acoustics and opined of Morricone: "His stick technique is adequate, but his charisma as a conductor is zero." Morricone, though, has said: "Conducting has never been important to me. If the audience comes for my gestures, they had better stay outside."

On February 26, 2012, Morricone made his Australian debut when he conducted the Western Australian Youth Orchestra together with a 100 voice chorus (made up primarily of WASO chorus members) at the Burswood Theatre (part of Crown Perth (formerly known as Burswood Entertainment Complex)) in Perth. On March 2, 2012, he conducted the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra at Elder Park, Adelaide as part of the Adelaide Festival of Arts.

On December 22, 2012, Morricone conducted the 85-piece Belgian orchestra "Orkest der Lage Landen" and a 100-piece choir during a two-hour concert in the Sportpaleis in Antwerp.[108]

In November 2013, Morricone began a world tour to coincide with the 50th anniversary of his film music career and performed in locations such as the Crocus City Hall in Moscow, Santiago, Chile, Berlin, Germany (O2 World), Budapest, Hungary, and Vienna (Stadhalle). Back in June 2014, Morricone had to cancel a U.S tour in New York (Barclays Center) and Los Angeles (Nokia Theatre LA Live) due to a back procedure done back on February 20. Morricone postponed the rest of his world tour and will resume it this Autumn.

Morricone has been using the studio to create his scores for the past 40 years. The studio has hosted many directors who have worked alongside him, including Brian De Palma, Oliver Stone and Barry Levinson.

Personal life[edit]

On 13 October 1956, he married Maria Travia, whom he had met in 1950 and had his first son, Marco, in 1957. Travia has written lyrics to complement her husband's pieces. Her works include the Latin texts for The Mission. They have three sons and a daughter, in order of birth: Marco (1957), Alessandra (1961), the conductor and film composer Andrea (Andrew) (1964), and Giovanni Morricone (1966), a filmmaker, who lives in New York City.

Influence and modern references[edit]

Morricone's influence also extends into the realm of pop music. Hugo Montenegro had a hit with a version of the main theme from The Good, the Bad and the Ugly in both the United Kingdom and the United States. This was followed by his album of Morricone's music in 1968.[111]

Aside from his music having been sampled by everyone from rappers (Jay-Z)[112] to electronic outfits (the Orb),[113] Morricone wrote "Se Telefonando", which became Italy's fifth biggest-selling record of 1966 and has since been re-recorded by Françoise Hardy, among many others, and scored the strings for "Dear God, Please Help Me" on Morrissey's 2006 Ringleader of the Tormentors album.

Morricone's film music was also recorded by many artists. John Zorn recorded an album of Morricone's music, The Big Gundown, with Keith Rosenberg in the mid-1980s. Lyricists and poets have helped convert some of his melodies into a songbook.

Morricone collaborated with world music artists, like Portuguese fado singer Dulce Pontes (in 2003 with Focus, an album praised by Paulo Coelho and where his songbook can be sampled) and virtuoso cellist Yo-Yo Ma (in 2004), who both recorded albums of Morricone classics with the Roma Sinfonietta Orchestra and Morricone himself conducting. The album Yo-Yo Ma Plays Ennio Morricone sold over 130,000 copies in 2004.[114]

In 1990 the American singer Amii Stewart, best known for the 1979 disco hit "Knock On Wood", recorded a tribute album entitled Pearls – Amii Stewart Sings Ennio Morricone for the RCA label, including a selection of the composer's best-known songs. Since the mid-1980s Stewart resides in Italy, the Pearls album features Rome's Philharmonic Orchestra and was co-produced by Morricone himself.[115]

Morricone inspired the namesake of Morricone Youth, a New York band dedicated to playing music from film and television, founded by musician and radio host Devon E. Levins. In addition to composers like Lalo Schifrin and Jerry Goldsmith, the band has performed music from a large spectrum of Morricone's film career, ranging from his work in the spaghetti westerns to The Exorcist II, as well as original Morricone-inspired pieces.[119]

British band Muse cites Morricone as an influence for the songs "City of Delusion", "Hoodoo", and "Knights of Cydonia" on their album Black Holes and Revelations. The band has recently started playing the song "Man With A Harmonica" live played by Chris Wolstenholme, as an intro to "Knights of Cydonia".[121]

Discography[edit]

Worldwide sales[edit]

Ennio Morricone has sold well over 70 million records worldwide during his career that spanned over six decades,[124][125] including 6,5 million albums and singles in France,[126] over three million in the United States and more than two million albums in Korea.[127] In 1971, the composer received his first golden record (disco d'oro) for the sale of 1,000,000 records in Italy[128][129] and a "Targa d'Oro" for the worldwide sales of 22 million.[130]

Top worldwide film grosses[edit]

Ennio Morricone has been involved with at least fourteen different movies grossing over $25 million at the box office[131]

In 1984, the U.S. distributor of Sergio Leone's Once Upon a Time in America reportedly failed to file the proper paperwork so that Morricone's score, regarded as one of his best, would be eligible for consideration for an Academy Award.

Two years later, Morricone received his second Oscar nomination for The Mission.[65] He received also oscar nominations for his scores to The Untouchables (1987), Bugsy (1991) and Malèna (2000).[65]

Morricone and Alex North are the only composers to receive the Honorary Oscar since the award's introduction in 1928.[138] Ennio Morricone received the honorary Academy Award on February 25, 2007, presented by Clint Eastwood, "for his magnificent and multifaceted contributions to the art of film music." With the statuette came a standing ovation.[139] In conjunction with the honor, Morricone released a tribute album, We All Love Ennio Morricone, that featured as its centerpiece Celine Dion's rendition of "I Knew I Loved You" (based on "Deborah's Theme" from Once Upon a Time in America), which she performed at the ceremony. Behind-the-scenes studio production and recording footage of "I Knew I Loved You" can be viewed in the debut episode of the QuincyJones.com Podcast.[140] The lyric, as with Morricone's Love Affair, had been penned by Oscar-winning husband-and-wife duo Marilyn and Alan Bergman. Morricone's acceptance speech was in his native Italian tongue and was interpreted by Clint Eastwood, who stood to his left. Eastwood and Morricone had in fact met two days earlier for the first time in 40 years at a reception.